Sunday, September 14, 2008

The Democratic presidential candidate's slump in the polls has sparked pointed private criticism that he is squandering a once-in-a-generation chance to win back the White House.

Party elders also believe the Obama camp is in denial about warnings from Democratic pollsters that his true standing is four to six points lower than that in published polls because of hidden racism from voters - something that would put him a long way behind Mr McCain.

The Sunday Telegraph has learned that senators, governors and union leaders who have experience of winning hard-fought races in swing states have been bombarding Obamas campaign headquarters with telephone calls offering advice. But many of those calls have not been returned.

He got off on the wrong foot with the "bitter clingers" and has not managed to get back on their right side. Now with Sarah Palin attracting the "bitter clinger" vote because she is one of them he has his work cut out for him. How does he win them back? There is already evidence he doesn't have a clue. Here is some more:

A senior Democratic strategist, who has played a prominent role in two presidential campaigns, told The Sunday Telegraph: "These guys are on the verge of blowing the greatest gimme in the history of American politics. They're the most arrogant bunch Ive ever seen. They won't accept that they are losing and they won't listen."

After leading throughout the year, Mr Obama now trails Mr McCain by two to three points in national polls.

Party leaders and commentators say that the Democrat candidate spent too much of the summer enjoying his own popularity and not enough defining his positions on the economy - the number one issue for voters - or reaching out to those blue collar workers whose votes he needs if he is to beat Mr McCain.

Others concede that his trip to Europe was a distraction that enhanced his celebrity status rather than his electability on Main Street, USA.

Yep. That "Celebrity" commercial that McCain ran and that went viral on the Internet punctured that bubble. ∅bama has come off as weak. And as I pointed out in Midway For Obama, Americans do not elect weaklings to office.

Since Sarah Palin was unveiled as Mr McCain's running mate, the Obama camp has faced accusations that it has been pushed off message and has been limp in responding to attacks.

A Democratic National Committee official told The Sunday Telegraph: "I really find it offensive when Democrats ask the Republicans not to be nasty to us, which is effectively what Obama keeps doing. They know thats how the game is played."

Dem mean ole Republicans are being mean to us. Waaaaaaaah. Mommy make them stop. It hoits. Not a winning message.

Mr Obama's campaign manager, David Plouffe, called it the first day of the rest of the campaign.

But that was the fourth time in the last nine months that Mr Obamas team have been forced to declare that the gloves are coming off. And Mr Plouffe's dismissal of Democratic doubts as hand-wringing and bed-wetting only served to reinforce the growing doubts about what some see as a bunker mentality among Obamas inner circle - where outside advice, even from highly experienced people, is not welcomed.

The Democratic strategist told The Sunday Telegraph: "They think they know best. They don't return calls. There are governors and senators calling them up with ideas. They don't get back to them.

"These are senior people from the border states and the South who know how to beat Republicans, and they're being ignored. They ignored everyone during the primaries and they came through it, so they think they can do the same again."

Damn. The ∅ campaign has more pairs of gloves than OJ. What ∅ needs to do with some of his campaign money (which is not flowing the way it used to be) is to buy a glove factory so he can spend his days putting on and taking off the gloves. Better yet, I think he needs to buy a clue factory. Fortunately he is too proud to do something like that.

Obama's big mistake is in thinking that a campaign that worked in the Democrat primary caucuses can work in a general election. Thugs like ACORN can take you far in a caucus state. However, there are no caucus states in general elections. Vote fraud and voter intimidation only carry you so far in a general election. It works in big cities, especially in Democrat Machine Cities. In the suburbs and rural areas its effect is slight to non-existent.

Mark Cunningham of the New York Post summed up the private views of many: "If it suddenly seems like the Obama campaign doesn't have any idea what it's doing, maybe that's because it doesn't."

Party elders are also studying internal polling material which warns the Obama camp that his true standing is worse than it appears in polls because voters lie to polling companies about their reluctance to vote for a black candidate. The phenomenon is known in the US as the Bradley effect, after Tom Bradley, a black candidate for governor of California who lost after leading comfortably in polls.

The strategist said: "I've seen memos where they've been told to factor in four to six points for the Bradley effect, but they're in denial about it.

They hope to make it up with the youth vote. That may have worked except for two things. The youth factor exceeds in enthusiasm that is for sure, but it has a bad record of showing up for elections. Second, since the announcement of Palin as VP the youth vote is now evenly split between Obama and McCain. Besides, youth thrives on novelty and Obama is so yesterday. He was last year's celebrity. And now there is a new fresh face on the block.

And what has been the McCain Campaign's best line of attack?

A senior aide to one of the most powerful Democrats in the House of Representatives voiced the fears of many: "Palin doesn't just play to the Republican base. She has much broader appeal."

The aide said that her repeated mockery of Mr Obama's boasts about his time as a community organiser in Chicago are "the most effective criticisms of Barack Obama we have yet seen." He said: "Americans in small and medium size towns dont know what the hell a community organiser is. Real Americans graduate from high school or college and get a job that pays a wage. Campus radicals go off and organise a community."

That is right. Obama has been tarred with the campus radical label in two words. However, considering his Communist mentor Frank Marshall Davis, his seeking out Marxist professors, and his associations with Bill Ayers, it fits pretty well. On top of that he admits he was a failure at community organizing. Evidently Marxism doesn't even sell well to its target population: the poor.

Another Brit paper, The Times Online tells a similar tale of woe about the ∅ campaign.

THE high-heeled, moose-hunting governor of Alaska has sent Barack Obama’s campaign into a state of panic as support for the Democratic presidential candidate haemorrhages in the battleground states he must win to reach the White House.

Sarah Palin, 44, continued to scythe through Obama’s support among women by taunting the first potential black president for declining to choose Hillary Clinton as his running mate and by declaring that questions about juggling work and family were “kind of irrelevant” in the modern age.

The mother of five, who has been called Xena, the warrior princess, said in a television interview: “I think he’s regretting not picking [Clinton] now, I do. What determination and grit and even grace through some tough shots that were fired her way - she handled those well,” Palin said.

I saw that. It should help the McCain/Palin ticket pick off a few more Hillary voters.

In the face of Palin’s onslaught, Obama has continued to base his campaign on the outdated claim that John McCain and his running mate represent four more years of a failed Bush administration.

A senior Obama adviser said candidly that claim did not work. “I don’t think it’s sticking. The McCain campaign has stolen our message of ‘change’ - the very thing we’ve been campaigning on for 20 months. Well, who’s the change? It’s McCain.” Palin’s astounding rise has left the Obama camp floundering for a new narrative that will capture the imagination of voters in the run-up to the November 4 election. “There is overreaction and panic,” the official admitted. “The hard part for Barack is she’s stolen his thunder a bit. It has knocked us off our game.”

Actually, as far as I can tell, they have no game at this point except mud slinging. Change has been stolen from them and they are left without Hope.

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